Red Wicket Market Farm is a small farm 25 minutes from downtown Columbus, Ohio, near Slate Run Metropark. Breeding Black Ameraucanas and Black Copper Marans to the Standard of Perfection.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Egg sizing: What goes into the carton?

If you've been a customer for a while, you've probably noticed that you get many different sizes of eggs. In fact, our cartons don't say "Large Eggs" or anything similar--instead, they say mixed size.

Hens lay different sizes of eggs depending on the age and breed of the bird, the time of the year, and the weather. The first eggs that a hen lays, called "pullet eggs," are often very small, and she may lay smaller eggs for the first season or so. Hens that lay green and blue eggs also tend to lay smaller eggs. Older hens tend to lay fewer but larger eggs, and some that we get are double-yolkers so big we wouldn't be able to close the egg cartons.

Here is a sample of the eggs I gathered just yesterday:

And here is the big egg on the left next to the tiny pullet egg on the right:

Because of the different sizes of eggs we get through the year, we have a basic rule of thumb about what goes into the carton. We don't include anything smaller than a medium sized egg or anything too big to fit in the carton (size extra-jumbo)--so in the photo above, you wouldn't get the itty-bitty egg on the right and you wouldn't get the giant egg on the left. We do special request cartons, though--if you want a dozen small pullet eggs (higher yolk to white ratio, yummy!) or you want a carton of jumbos, let us know and if we have the eggs we'll work something out for you.

If you're not sure what size the eggs you have are, the easiest thing to do is weigh them. Sometimes, especially in the spring when the hens are laying huge eggs, you might get a carton of all extra-large and jumbo eggs and then the regular large eggs look tiny!